New Delhi, 23 December 2015: Mr. Dilip Tirkey, Member Parliament (Bhartiya Janta Dal) and former Captain of Indian Hockey Team today raised the issue of Sports Quota recruitments in Government Departments and Centre PSU’s during the proceedings of Rajya Sabha.

Raising the voice for rural and tribal players in the Rajya Sabha Mr. Tirkey said “Players from rural and urban areas do not participate in the sports only for the entertainment or fun sake, Infact they play sports to make their careers and earn their livelihood”.

Giving examples of some rural and tribal players who have represented country at the international levels but are now in woeful state due to unemployment. He mentioned that how national shooting woman player is forced to run a Dhaba, International women athletes are forced to sell gol-gappas, international Karate players are selling tea and woman football players are running pan-shops.

Mr. Tirkey said “It is highly saddening what do we want to give to our coming generations by showing this apathy towards our international players. This is happening because our Government Departments and PSUs are not filling jobs under sports quota. I would like to further request that government should interfere in this matter and all our distinguished sportspersons including these four should be recruited through sports quota”.

He also mentioned that all the Government Departments and Centre PSUs have a provision of five percent recruitment under sports quota. Giving some examples of Central PSUs in his own state Odisha who are not doing the sports quota recruitment as per norms Mr. Tirkey said “The central PSUs like SAIL, NTPC, MCL, NALCO, Paradip Port Trust, HAL etc are also not doing the sports quota recruitment as per norms. Because of which our tribal people are now forced to migrate for jobs. It is very sad that our national players are not able to secure even a job for themselves even after 8-10 years of national and international careers. If it continues, our sports will further go down. Therefore I would like to urge upon the government to look into this matter”.

During this Mr. Tirkey also urged the government that the guidelines for s five percent ports quota recruitment in the private sector to be also issued soon.